Tabloid, Newspaper | featured news

A British lawmaker said Thursday that he and 17 others have been awarded payouts over phone hacking by the News of the World newspaper.

James Murdoch has resigned from the boards of the companies that publish its British newspapers including the now-defunct News of the World tabloid at the center of the phone hacking sandal, regulatory filings show.

Actor Hugh Grant said Monday that he believes his phone was hacked by Britain's Mail on Sunday tabloid - the first time he has implicated a newspaper not owned by Rupert Murdoch in the wrongdoing.

The defense offered by James Murdoch in a Thursday appearance before the committee of Parliament tasked with getting to the bottom of the phone hacking scandal can be summed up in three parts: I didn't know about it. Blame the people who should've told me about it. The people who say they did tell me about it are wrong.

News International is expected to pay about three million pounds($4.7 million) to settle hacking claims by the family of murder victim Milly Dowler against the now defunct News of the World newspaper, sources close to the case told Reuters on Monday.

Former senior News Corp. executive Les Hinton is being recalled to testify before a parliamentary committee over a phone-hacking scandal involving journalists at the now defunct News of the World newspaper, a spokesman for the panel said Tuesday.

James Murdoch was aware that another News of the World reporter was seemingly implicated in illegal tapping, despite his statements to the contrary, say two top executives of the now-defunct newspaper. Media executive James Murdoch knew of a damaging piece of evidence three years ago that phone hacking was practiced by more than one reporter at the News of the World tabloid, despite his statements to the contrary, two of his former colleagues said Tuesday.

Andy Coulson, who worked as UK PM David Cameron's adviser, continued to receive payments from the newspaper at the centre of the UK phone hacking scandal, after he had left as editor.

Harbottle & Lewis, the law firm embroiled in the phone-hacking scandal sweeping Rupert Murdoch's News of the World newspaper, has taken the unusual step of fighting back against its former client to preserve its reputation.

Heather Mills was quoted on Wednesday as saying a journalist at British publisher Trinity Mirror, owner of the Daily Mirror tabloid newspaper, had hacked her phone before she was married to former Beatle Paul McCartney.